


who names their café 'honeysuckle' anyway?

by ocaptainrogers



Category: The Hobbit RPF
Genre: Fluff, Humour, I hope, M/M, Pre-Slash, Romance, Slash, Writer!Dean, baker!aidan, coffee shop AU, lee and richard are the gay baristas that run the place
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-06-14
Updated: 2013-10-07
Packaged: 2017-12-15 00:18:30
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 21,008
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/843123
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ocaptainrogers/pseuds/ocaptainrogers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Dean walked into that coffee shop with the bell and the Brazilian Walnut tables, all he had in mind was to get a cup of coffee and maybe get some writing done.</p><p>Then, all of a sudden, he's the regular everyone knows by name - he's got a table for Christ's sake, and he may or may not have a crush on the baker that supplies the place with the most delicious pastries he's ever had in his whole life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Ok, so Dean is a writer. He can call himself that because he writes, he does, he writes a whole lot; he’s been stuck in the same story for three years though, and has barely written anything since then, but that still counts as a writer doing writer’s-stuff, right? His brother, Brett, tells him he can’t call himself one unless – not _until_ – one of his works has been published, and blatantly refuses to acknowledge the fact that one can actually be a _writer_ even though nothing of your work has been picked up on the third try or sold ten thousand copies on the first run.

They had an argument about this last time Dean was home and it ended with a sore head (on Brett’s part), loud arguments, and their mother telling them to let that damn thing go or get out of the house without a taste of the cherry pie she’d just put into the oven.

Brett still calls Dean an idiot whenever they talk and moans at him, asking why he couldn’t just keep to painting and taking pictures: _why’d ya have to take up_ writing _, Dean, ya never get anything done anyway._

Which is always what you want to hear when you’ve been stuck rewriting the same three pages of empty dialogue for over a thousand days; it really does help with the motivation.

So, on the one thousand-six-hundred-and-fourth day of not being able to get _anywhere at all_ with his dreaded book-project, Dean O’Gorman, hobby photographer and painter, Struggling writer, and Kiwi city-boy from Auckland, goes to town and buys a big suitcase and a new bag for his camera, packs all his essentials and moves to England.

Great idea. Marvellous. Absolutely wonderful.

 _Terrible_.

His plane is late from the airport in Auckland and he doesn’t want to blame it on himself though in reality it sort of _was_ his fault: he’d forgotten that the first thing he’d tossed into his backpack was his passport, so he had to empty the entire thing in front of annoyed flight attendants and grumpy in-line passengers, with something of a stomach virus coming on, all the while apologizing and trying not to start crying because that whole ordeal really wasn’t good for his mental health.

It’s a fucking disaster, but at least he didn’t get sick on the nice old lady sitting next to him on the flight to England, so counts that as a point in his favour.

And when he does land and has successfully claimed his big, lumpy, bright green suitcase and is sitting on the train taking him to London, he becomes painfully aware of the fact that in his haste to get away from Brett and the smell of his old flat and the boring sounds of Auckland, he has completely forgotten that a place to live in once he get there would be nice.

He arrives in London, it’s dark, but the air is clear, he can see stars up in the sky although they’re hard to catch since the city lights are so bright, and he has absolutely no idea where the hell he should go. Londoners are walking past him, not sparing him a second glance, probably thinking him a lost little tourist that forgot to get a map. They all keep their chins up and huddle under their coats even though it’s not that cold out and stride past.

Dean watches them for a while, his suitcase at his feet and his packed-to-the-brim backpack hanging from one strap on his shoulder. Cars are swishing by him, sometimes so fast that he wants to yell at them to ‘hey, slow down there, mate!’ but he doesn’t; this isn’t his city, and he’s too tired to yell anyway. He hasn’t even got anywhere to sleep for the night, either. Brett would laugh at him.

He ends up getting a hotel room for the night, opting to go searching for flats in the morning. He phones his mum and tells her that ‘yeah, flat’s looking alright, ‘s a bit small, though’ because he’s too embarrassed to tell her that that is the one thing he completely forgot about. She would also tell Brett and Dad about that whole thing too, and Dean doesn’t want another reason for his family to laugh at him. He says goodnight, tells her to say hi to Dad, doesn’t mention Brett, and hangs up.

He stares out the window at the streetlights and busy cars and strangers about down under him and wonders if this really was a good idea. There are sirens from police cars blaring every ten minutes, some guys are hollering at each other outside that pub down the street and there’s this strange smell wafting through the open crack in the window from the Indian restaurant down there somewhere, but somehow Dean is happy.

There was no Indian parlour under his flat in Auckland, and he couldn’t normally see the moon since his bedroom window was facing the building right next to it, and there certainly wasn’t a noisy bar a hundred meters down the street from it. It’s different and weird and it’s just what he needs; it’s what he decided to move for in the first place – there was just a need to be somewhere that wasn’t New Zealand, and so far it appears to be going great, considering.

Just before he’s about to nod off he collects his camera bag, gingerly lifts his Canon 5D Mark III out and snaps a picture of the crescent moon resting on the rooftop of the building across the hotel. The picture looks like shit but for some reason he can’t bring himself to delete it. He falls asleep right after and doesn’t wake up until the sun glares at his face in the morning nine hours later.

-

If there was one thing Dean didn’t give much thought to when he was packing his bag home in New Zealand it was how huge London really is. Much larger than Auckland, and so clean and intricate and just … beautiful in a way that Auckland never was. He’d seen pictures of course, but walking over _Tower Bridge,_ seeing a giant cucumber-shaped building behind some other normal-shaped buildings makes him feel uncommonly small and insignificant and free and ready to write ten more books _right now_.

It’s sunny, at least, and there’s a mild breeze playing with his hair and birds singing in the trees he’s walking past on his way to check out one of the addresses he’s circled out in a newspaper. He left his baggage at the hotel, got a map from one of the clerks (he was very nice and helped him find the ad-section) and went out. That was three hours ago and he’s still having trouble finding that last place.

He stops when he’s gotten down from the bridge and is walking along the Thames and takes a closer look at the map. Frowning, he sits down on the bench at his right and folds it out, not caring that he must look like a complete weirdo.

 _Farrington Road_ , the clerk said, but where the hell is fucking _Farrington Road_? He’s not asking strangers either, wanting to do this by himself because he’s a stubborn bastard at best, and a bit of a fool, maybe, but right now he doesn’t care. At last he finds it, in one of the folds of the map, and gets up and starts walking in its direction.

The flat is located not far from corner leading off to _Rosebery Avenue,_ a little street bearing the adoringly sweet name _Honeybine Lane._

“ _Honeybine Lane_ ,” Dean mumbles to himself and laughs because this place is absolutely perfect. The door is huge and dark and has the numbers _13d_ on it in a brass. There’s a – and he takes a double take because there’s a _bell_ hanging on the side of the door. One of those old-fashion ones that are decorated with intricate and beautiful patters; it looks as if the leaves and flowers descripted on it were once painted green, but now the paint is starting to peel off. A long brass chain hangs from it and he is almost afraid to yank it because this surely must be the most wonderful piece of artefact he’s ever seen and considering how bad his luck has been up until this point he doesn’t want to ruin this as well.

When he does ring the bell it doesn’t take more than three seconds before the door gets thrown open and a short man with a round stomach and wild dark hair appears behind it. The man is wearing large round glasses and a worn-out plaid shirt that was once red, Dean thinks. Now it looks orange-y or brown.

“Hullo,” the man says and smiles, taking in Dean’s appearance.

“Good afternoon,” Dean responds when he remembers his manners and holds out his hand. “Dean O’Gorman. I’m here about the flat?”

The man shakes his hand vigorously and gives him a bright smile, “of course, of course! Come in, it’s right through here-,”

Dean jumps up the steps and closes the door behind him because the man with the crazy hair and no socks on is already walking excitedly through the building and chatting and explaining things.

“-I haven’t had many coming to see it and I was sure I’d have to take the ad down,” he talks fast, and bubbly, and it reminds Dean of a character from a book he read ages ago that he can’t remember the name of.

“Gotta say I’m glad to hear from you, oh, sorry I didn’t catch your name,” the man stops short and Dean has to grab hold of the railing of the stairs so he won’t crash into him.

“Dean. O’Gorman,” he says again.

“Peter Jackson,” says the man and smiles again. “The flat I wrote about is just up here,” he explains and gestures towards the stairs that belongs to the railing Dean is holding on to. He lets go and nods and smiles and hopes he doesn’t look as lost as he feels.

Peter takes a step around him and starts walking up the stairs, Dean follows quickly not wanting to miss anymore of his explanations and … rambling. “It’s quite small, I’ve got to tell you that,” Peter says and he sounds a bit apologetic though Dean can’t find any fault in a tiny apartment. It’s better than the hotel-room, at any cost.

“That’s alright. It’s just going to be me living here anyway,” Dean says once they’ve reached ‘his’ floor.

Peter nods, a bit out of breath, and smiles, shoving his hands into the pockets of his trousers. “It’s got one bedroom, a bath, washroom, and the living room and kitchen are sorta in-one, if you get my meaning,” he says and leads the way into the flat.

“That’s fine,” Dean mumbles around a smile. He finds himself liking Peter more by the second, he seems like the greatest fellow you can find around these parts.

“You’re from New Zealand aren’t you?” Peter suddenly asks once he’s shown Dean the bedroom and looks at him in a way that Dean can’t quite place. It makes Dean think of the way his friends look at him once he starts talking about something that interests them, a bit like ‘please talk more about this, I want to hear your thoughts on it’.

He nods, “yeah, Auckland.”

Peter nods and gives him a small smile, and all of a sudden he reminds Dean of one of his uncles back home. “Pukerua Bay,” he says and suddenly slips into his New Zealand-accent as he talks about the arrangement with the TV and internet, and how the washing machine works, taking Dean completely by surprise; if there was one thing he didn’t expect from this unpremeditated trip to London it was finding that his landlord was a fellow Kiwi.

“You do a great English accent,” Dean marvels, unable to think of anything else to say, when he’s done explaining.

Peter laughs. “Well, you could say I’ve been practising,” he says and that’s it. Dean signs the form ten minutes later and they discuss the rent over tea downstairs and when Dean leaves he says he’ll be back with all his stuff later that afternoon. Peter tells him to come right in when he does, just to give him a shout that he’s there and he’ll help carry all it up.

Dean laughs and smiles and decides that he really likes Peter. There’s just something about his presence that makes him not feel as scared as he was when he was standing on the pavement with nowhere else to go than a cheap hotel down the road.

***

A week and a half later he has settled in properly, doesn’t miss Auckland as much as he’d thought, has gotten a job as waiter in a classy restaurant five minutes down the road, and has started his coffee shop-search.

Dean has always loved coffee shops. It’s just something about the atmosphere in them that’s like medicine for the soul, something about the warm, comfortable energy floating around in one that seems to help with his little writer’s block.

He wrote his first story in a coffee shop, actually (he never got done with that one either, but whenever he was inspired enough to write it all came out very quickly), one back in Auckland called the _Sanguine café_ – the name somewhat ill-fitting, considering that it got shut down a few years back, unfortunately, due to what the health department had called a ‘severe rat and rat infestation’.

No one – in his neighbourhood, especially – had been thrilled at having their favourite café shut down, but the knowledge that there had lived five scabbed raccoons and no less than fourteen rats in the building somehow made the loss a lot less depressing than it would’ve been. If he remembers correctly the entire street wanted the building burned to the ground

He still shivers unpleasantly whenever he thinks about it.

The story he’d written had nothing to do with wild animals living in below-average coffee shops, though. It had been about two people falling love, as most stories are. This particular love story took place on a boat; partly because he wanted his story to differ from (some of) the others, but still he hadn’t showed it to anybody. Not that he made a habit of showing anything he ever wrote to eyes that weren’t his own.

His mum knew about it, sure, and sort of knew what it was about from the bits and pieces he’d chosen to share with her, but he’d always felt like that story had never been made for sharing. It was his first, and it was kind of badly written, so even if the opportunity presented itself and he could show it around and make a sale on it, he wouldn’t. That sentiment alone is probably also the reason he’s kept from maculating the thing several times over the last ten years as well.

That is also the reason why he’s working his ass off, wringing his brain, in hopes of coming up with ways to continue the story he’s currently stuck on. He’s even moved from familial, comfortable Auckland, to London, high in hopes and feeling pretty confident that a change in environment might get the words start flowing again.

And if he ever does get started on this offending piece of _nothing_ , which is basically what he has right now, it’ll be his fifth. Not including the ‘love story on the boat’ thing he’s saved on an old pen drive and tucked away in a pencil case he can’t even remember what looks like, but knows it’s in his new flat someplace.

All he knows is that he better find himself another café to write in. So he’s been walking around downtown London every day this last week trying out several cafés, even entering a couple _Starbucks_ in pure desperation – most of which did nothing but give him earache from all the noise and strange scents that made his clothes smell funny.

He hates his clothes smelling funny. Like when he leans too far over the plate of pizza he’s eating and his shirt ends up smelling like pizza for days.

So far none of them has struck his fancy. They’re all either too intimate, or too impersonal and boring, or way too loud, or juts downright ugly. He has been on the verge of giving up a couple of times too, and would’ve hadn’t it been for his weird, over-imaginative and hobbit-like landlord and fellow Kiwi, Peter Jackson, who’s always telling him to keep going; _“You’ll find it, Deano. There are hundreds of coffee shops here, mate!”_

Dean is glad he listens to Peter because otherwise he would’ve never found _the_ perfect coffee shop - the coffee shop that beats all other coffee shops into a pile of broken tables and porcelain cups and dances on their remains. The coffee shop that will, currently unbeknownst to him, slowly and steadily become his second home. Or third home, you know, since … whatever. You get it.

When it comes to _why,_ as inwhy it’s this particular café and not the third one he tried - which was sort of nice too -he simply doesn’t know. He _was_ looking for a place to sit down and have a cup of coffee, that is, after all, what this entire thing is about - carrying his laptop with him everywhere in his dark leather shoulder-bag just in case a few more words wanted out.

It might’ve been the name, he thinks when he sits down and ponders on it; the very unusual (for a coffee shop, or practically anything), strangely welcoming; The _Honeysuckle_ , but before he can analyse it any further he’s pushing the door open and walking in.

Who the hell names anything _Honeysuckle_ anyway, that’s just weird, but he’s walking in anyway. Perhaps because it had ‘honey’ in it, like his street-name, or maybe because his mother has lots of honeysuckles in her garden, he doesn’t know, and to tell you the truth he isn’t that keen to find out.

There’s a small bronze bell hanging low from the ceiling just inside and when the top of the door nudges it on its way past, it gives off a dull _dung_ that he can’t describe as anything other than painfully beautiful.

He has to look up, his lips forming the shape of an amused smile, and take a look at it, to see if it’s as adorable as the sound it just made. True enough, if the tear-drop shaped bronze bell had been a child one would’ve cooed and pinched its cheeks whilst trying to stuff its face with sweets. This is one of those times he really regrets leaving his camera in the flat.

Dean spends another moment unabashedly admiring the thing before he realizes why he’s here in the first place. Giving a slight startle as someone brushes past him on their way out he can’t make himself move too far away from the door as its top brushes past its brass friend, the bell, again and his lips twitch as it sings happily.

It has most of the typical shape of a blue bell flower; the bottom has some kind of writing on it, probably Latin from the way the words are written. He can only make out the words ‘ _hic vos mos reperio amor’_ , but since he’s not fluent in Italian or Latin, or whatever the hell it is, he has no idea what it says.

He dismisses the Latin for now and focuses on the etchings covering the upper half of the bell – it looks like … like honeysuckles or maybe roses, and leaves, and other utterly romantic stuff that he has never seen on a bell before, but it fits so he lets it go.

Eventually, he gets over his fascination with the door and the bell and makes his way over to the counter. On the way he allows himself a quick once-over of the place; it’s cosy and homey, as the bell’s song implied would one care to listen closely enough – Dean has always been interested in this sort of things so he knows what he’s talking about.

It’s quite a big place, actually, much bigger than most of the other coffee shops he’d visited – he thinks it might’ve been a restaurant before, that maybe someone bought it and thought it’d make a decent café instead.

The lower half of the walls are wooden panels, all stained to a rather dark colour, but they’re a perfect combination to the dull yellow shade of the upper half. They’ve really gotten the look of the place right, Dean thinks. If it weren’t a café, he’d liked to move in and live here.

The counter is placed in the middle of the shop, extruding from the back wall, built from a type of dark wood that he thinks may be walnut, but he’s not a carpenter so he would never know for sure. It too matches the dark panel, so it might not be walnut at all – could be stained oak for all he knows.

It’s certainly not a chain driven café, one can see that pretty quickly – there’s what looks like actual dining tables systematically placed, four in total – good number - in one end of the room by the windows. They’re about half the size of a regular dining table, but it looks much like they can be extended to that size if there’s need for it. The right side of the shop is divided into sections with smaller tables; all of them share the same dark, deep brown colour. Same with the left.

He runs the tip of his fingers over one of the empty tables as he’s walking past and if feels so soft and hard at the same time that he’s got the sudden urge to lie down and take a nap on it. Even the feet of the tables are beautifully carved, some of which carry a similar flower-pattern to what he saw on the bell.

He nods approvingly to himself – whoever set up this shop did an amazing job. Really amazing.

The chairs, all wooden with stuffed seats, a dark blue striped fabric, are of the same dark wooden material as the tables. Not stained, though, and now that he’s taking a better look at them it’s definitely walnut – might even be Brazilian Walnut, and the only reason he knows that is because that’s what his writing desk home in Auckland was made of before he sold it to afford the plane-ticket to London.

The café’s not too bright and not too dark, but he reckons that when night falls over London and the owner dims the lights, this place will look even more beautiful – it’s only four in the afternoon, but he desperately wants to stay until it darkens, just to see if he’s right.

Now that he’s finished his architectural view of the place he finds himself a little disappointed that it’s not swarming with people in here – there’s only seven in total, including himself.

He dismisses the thought and wanders over to the counter and the guy half lying over it; either incredibly bored or looking at something very small sitting on the desk. Dean hopes that if it _is_ a small thing it better be a freckle on the wood and not a bug; he’s not a big fan of bugs.

He’s about to clear his throat to get the guy’s attention when he notices the foot-long blackboard on one end of the desk showing off their most popular orders and the _Today’s Special_ , and he accidentally reads it out loud instead of inside his head, “Wh-, Caramel caffe latte with a dip of syrup, vanilla and … cinnamon sprinkles?”

The guy’s head snaps up to look at him, lips pulling into a grin, “Today’s special. Good choice, comin’ right up.” He’s definitely American, sporting a light scruff and looks to be Dean’s own age, maybe a few years older. His eyes, crinkled at the corners, under thick eyebrows, are gleaming with a sort of friendliness you don’t expect to see in places like this.

“Um,” Dean starts, because that’s not what he wanted to order, it just slipped, but the guy is already over at the espresso machine, pushing buttons. “Okay,” Dean murmurs to himself and looks awkwardly down at his shoes. There’s a white smudge on his right boot; he groans and tries to wipe it away with his left. When he looks back up, the barista is walking back towards him with a large white cup filled with steaming liquid in his hands.

“Here ya go, one caramel caffe latte with a dip of syrup, vanilla, sprinkled with cinnamon,” he says and gently puts it down on the counter, on top of a bright white flat plate. “Tea spoons are right there if you need one,” he says and sends Dean a genuine smile that no one gets to see in coffee shops anymore. It’s all rushed nowadays; people don’t get personal and friendly like this with their customers and it’s such damn shame.

Dean idly thinks this might be his favourite café ever and he hasn’t even tried anything yet.

“Thank you, uh-,”

“Lee,” the guy says and presents his hand, again something one would never expect from a barista. Dean is pleasantly surprised. Very much so.

“Dean. Nice to meet you, Lee,” he replies and reaches over the desk to shake his hand, feeling a smile of his own spread over his lips. “How much do I owe you?”

“Two pounds,” Lee shrugs with another smile. “D’ya want anything else, by the way? Our blueberry muffins are extremely popular,” he offers with raised brows and gestures toward the pastries on the left end of the counter.

Dean follows his hand and his jaw nearly drops; behind a window of glass lays the most beautiful collection of pastries he’s ever seen. The blueberry muffins in themselves looks like a damn treasure, Lee’s right about that, but there are also all kinds of fresh pies, cupcakes decorated with what appears to be practically everything. Carrot cakes, brownies, peanut butter pies and what has to be the most delicious-looking Oreo cake he’s ever laid eyes on.

There are also dozens of other pies and cakes that he doesn’t know the names of, but it all looks so good he wants to buy them all and gorge himself in them.

“Uhm,” he says dumbly and has to reach up and disguise his hand looking for any drool as an itch. Luckily, he’s not standing there with saliva dripping out of the corner of his lip, but he reckons it was a close call.

Lee is still waiting for him to say something, so he gives them all another once-over before he decides. “A piece of brownie, please.”

The barista nods and is about to pull out a slice before he hesitates, as if he forgot something, “With, or without peanuts?” his hand is hovering over what Dean thinks is a non-peanut slice. “We had an allergy mishap a few months ago, you should be glad you didn’t see any of it.”

Dean blinks and stares, “Uh, N-no peanuts.” He isn’t even allergic to peanuts and he likes peanuts, so why didn’t he _say_ _peanuts?_

“Alrighty,” Lee grins and pulls out a slice that’s already on a plate and places it beside the cup. “Three fifty, then.”

Dean hands him the money, politely thanks him and looks around for a table. He immediately spots one in the corner between a window and the yellow-and-dark-panel wall, and walks over, careful not to spill the hot drink all over himself – he knows how much that hurts.

He’s only just sat down when he notices the low thrum of music that flits through the café. It’s a calming song, the soft sounds of the piano reminding him of sitting inside on a rainy day. Dean sits there for a while just clutching his cup and feeling the warmth of it spread from his fingers, up his hands and arms. He can honestly say he’s never felt this calm in years, and he’s not even the slightest bit upset by it.

He’s almost surprised when the singing starts and the voice is so much softer and darker than he’d anticipated, but it’s beautiful and so calming. Letting out a long sigh he brings the cup up to his lips and inhales – it smells like cinnamon and coffee, as he’d expected. He settles back in his chair and takes a tentative sip, finding himself pleasantly surprised yet again; it actually tastes good despite everything that appears to be in it based on its name – he might have to get another one.

So, owner has awesome taste in furnishing, decoration _and_ music? Dean’s not entirely sure if he’s still alive and this is his version of Heaven.

It’s only after having drunk nearly the whole cup that Dean suddenly remembers that he has his laptop with him. He takes another bite of the brownie – which is as good as it looks – before he twists around in his chair so he can reach the laptop bag.

The zip is half open, but he has to turn back and take another bite before he can pull his laptop out. He hums approvingly at the taste and tries to keep it in his mouth for as long as he can before it gets too mushy, just to savour the taste. Man, whoever made this knew what they were doing.

Making a mental note to find out who baked them he pushes the on-button on the computer and takes another look around while he waits for it to start up.

Lee, the barista, has got company; an equally tall man with short dark hair and a shy smile. He is laughing, probably at something Lee said and pulls an apron up from behind the counter somewhere. He folds it in half and puts it on, tying a perfect bow behind his back.

Dean smiles softly at their obvious friendship and takes another sip of his latte, eyes still surveying the shop. He spots a couple on a date a few tables away from him, a large piece of carrot cake on a plate between them and two cups filled with something hot at their respective ends of the table.

Maybe he should write another love story, there are never enough of those around, right? He flicks his eyes over to the laptop-screen and frowns at the mush of words he has spent years trying to do improve. Maybe he should just start something new, it’s not like he’s going to get anywhere with this. He takes another look at everything around him and tries to get an idea of where to start.

It’s just then that he also notice the flowers; purple petunias in brown pots, placed all around the room. There are a couple on the counter, on every other table, in the windowsills and every other random place with enough room.

He counts them all - 42. This place just tipped the scale; Dean is beyond impressed right now and maybe even a bit in love. Ok, a lot in love.

Flicking his eyes back to his laptop, he groans and decides to gaze longingly out the window instead, immediately spotting a man carrying two large cardboard boxes in his arms, walking towards the café. The guy is attractive. All dark curly hair and dark eyes and a straight nose, broad shoulders, slim waist, and long legs. He looks scrawny, but Dean can see the defined muscles under his pink t-shirt – who the hell wears a t-shirt in London in _October_?

Dean shakes his head, sips quietly of his latte and follows the man with his eyes as he hurries across the street and eventually into the shop. The bell jingles happily as he pushes the door open and – is that a smile on his face? It is, and Dean swears to God, if the bell is the reason why he’s smiling like his greatest wish came true, Dean is going to marry that man.

“And the bell is happy to see you too, Turner!” Lee barks and cackles as he bends over the counter, looking at the man with the boxes and Dean barely manages to suppress a whimper; the newcomer likes the bell - the same bell Dean likes. Dean smiled at the bell when he walked in, and it looks very much like Mr. Turner has a habit of doing the same. Better start looking for rings, he thinks, and hopes the guy is single. And gay. _Please be gay, please be gay, please be gay._

“Shut yer mouth, Grinner!” the man snaps back with a wide grin, “I know the bell’s happy to see me, it loves me.”

 _He’s Irish_. Dean tries very hard not to collapse to the floor in a heap and cry.

He is also momentarily taken aback by their loud bickering and shoots his eyes around the shop to see if any of the other costumers are put-out too, but they’re all smiling and laughing and chatting and acting like they haven’t noticed anything out of the ordinary. Dean frowns before he suddenly gets that this must happen pretty regularly for people to become accustomed to box-carrying men storming in and yelling profanities. Dean has a very strong feeling he will, too.

Lee snorts and shrugs, “Sometimes I’m not entirely sure if you drop by with the goods because it’s your _job_ , or ‘cause you miss the ol’ Rose.”

Dean stops chewing the brownie he just put in his mouth and stares at the attractive bell-loving box-carrying newcomer. _The bell has a name._

“Oh, Rose. Definitely Rose,” the man says and his tone is serious, with only a hint of mockery around the edge. Dean sniggers quietly into his cup and hopes no one noticed.

“You’re one weird dude, Aidan,” Lee mutters and moves both boxes behind the counter. “Anyway, thank you for dropping by a bit later today, hope we didn’t cause any inconvenience.”

Dean takes another bite of the brownie and thinks _Aidan._

Aidan frowns and Dean can see it perfectly from this angle, how the soft skin around his eyes scrunch up ever so sligtly, “Don’ act like yeh give a crap, Lee, all yeh care about is yer goddamn coffee shop,” he bites back, but his tone is playful and there’s a smirk hanging on his lips.

Lee purses his lips, feigning thoughtfulness, and nods, “That’s true.”

Aidan laughs and Dean thinks it might be his new favourite sound. Well, that andthe bell. Don’t forget about the bell.

Eventually, Aidan walks back out with his worn-out, loose-fitting, pink t-shirt that says _Keep Blowin’_ and Dean immediately misses him. Which … is very weird, considering Dean has only been staring at him for about five minutes – no, not staring; _appreciating unnoticed from a distance_. He’d like to keep some dignity, thank you.

To make matters worse though, Aidan isn’t even aware of the fact that Dean exist – he didn’t even stop to take a look around when he dropped off the delivery.

It takes another ten minutes before he notices his empty plate now filled only with brownie crumbles and his even emptier cup, so he decides to get a new one. With Ray LaMontagne begging to _Let It Be Me_ in the background he stands up and walks over to the counter where the other tall man is standing instead of Lee. He didn’t even notice them switching as he watched Aidan and his pink shirt walk away.

“Um, hi,” he says to get his attention and lets his eyes wander over to the desserts for a moment before he drags them back.

The man smiles at him, open and friendly, and presents his hand, “Hullo, I’m Richard.”

He takes his hand and mentally wished all other coffee places were like this. Not that it matters though, he’ll never walk into another coffee shop in his life. “Dean,” he smiles.

“Could I get a …,” he starts and takes a pause to read the menu on the blackboard. “Cappuccino, please.”

“Of course,” Richard says and gestures towards the espresso machine. “How’d you like it?”

“Um,” Dean responds stupidly and has to take a moment to remember how one orders cappuccinos. After seeing Aidan it’s like everything has turned upside down. He’s pretty sure his heart has even started to beat out of rhythm. “Extra shot of espresso, please.”

Richard nods, grin still in place and makes his drink. “Anything on top?”

“Chocolate,” Dean smiles back and thanks him when he’s done and puts it on the counter. “Um, could I get a blueberry muffin as well?”

-

He didn’t get much writing done that day, but he is very happy to find that the coffee shop looks as beautiful as he thought it would when the sun goes down. Lee, if he is the one in charge of those things, has put up small lights everywhere in the shop, which he turned on when it got just the right amount of dark outside.

There are lights in the flowers, some hanging low in threads tied to the curtain rails, and there are even a couple candle lights lit on every single table. If Dean didn’t know it was October he’d think it was Christmas.

He’s not home in his apartment until it’s eight in the evening and he can honestly say that having spent over four hours in a coffee shop in one day did nothing but get him in a better mood. Putting his laptop-bag down just inside the door he makes a beeline for the bathroom; he has to pee something immensely – downing three large cups of coffees will do that to you.

He makes himself toast after and calls his mum as he’s buttering them.

_“Hello, darling.”_

“Hi, Mum,” Dean smiles and moves his phone to his shoulder so he can use both hands when he cuts the cheese. “I have found it.”

There’s a small pause in which he can practically hear the cogs in his mother’s head turning,

 _“The season five DVD of_ LOST? _Oh my god, your father is going be so excited to hear it, he’s been asking me and asking me to get you to find that thing-,”_

“What? No,” Dean frowns, his hands pausing over his half-finished toast. “I’m talking about the coffee shop; I found it.” How can his mum not know what he’s talking about? He mentioned it to her earlier today, and mothers are supposed to know what their children are talking about anyway, right?

_“Oh! Well, that’s great, Dean, which one is it?”_

“ _Honeysuckle,_ ” he says and waits for his mum to make that noise of recognition, but it never comes. Oh, of course it doesn’t, she’s not actually here. Dean’s a little confused in himself.

 _“Never heard of it,”_ his mum answers after a beat. _“Where’s it?”_

Dean sighs, shakes his head and continues to slice cheese. He fishes down the paprika and oregano spices from the shelf over the oven and sprinkles it over the cheese. “About a twenty minute walk from my flat, actually, and it’s the most beautiful coffee place I’ve ever seen.”

_“Sounds nice.”_

“ _Awesome_ , Mum,” he corrects and raises his brows even though she can’t see them. “I mean, the baristas shake your hand and tell you their names and they smile, and it’s got a _bell_ over the door!”

_“A bell-,”_

“There are forty-two purple petunias in there,” he adds and huffs, because it’s just that awesome. “Their lattes are amazing and this guy in a stupid pink shirt comes in and shouts – he’s Irish, Mum - and delivers the pastries – which are awesome too, by the way. And he-, he smiled at the bell, Mum. He _smiled_ at the _bell_.” He’s out of breath and somehow he’s standing in the middle of his living room and not in the kitchen. He looks around himself curiously and can’t remember having moved from his toasts which are still on the counter, half-done.

He walks back with his mother’s bubbly laughter in his ear.

_“So this place is pretty amazing, huh?”_

“Yeah,” Dean half-laughs and finishes his toasts. He idly wonders how Aidan’s toast would taste if he ever made one, but quickly shakes that thought out of his head, not sure where that came from in the first place.

_“What is it with you and bells, though. You had a bell by your door in your old apartment – nobody does that.”_

Dean looks over his shoulder at his bell that he actually brought with him and put up; a small one, not so unlike _Rose_ at the _Honeysuckle_ and thinks maybe he should come up with a name for it. “Bells are awesome.”

His mother laughs through the phone, _“Alright, honey. I’m going to visit you and go with you sometime, to see if it’s as spectacular as you say it is.”_

Dean huffs because _of course it fucking is._

 _“We miss you, Dean,”_ she says then, but luckily for the both of them she doesn’t sound close to tears, just mildly annoyed at his haste to get away.

“Yeah, I miss you too.”

They talk for a bit about life back home, his father’s bad back, Brett’s job, and the weather. They say goodbye, still no crying on her end, thank God for that. He hangs up and tosses the phone on the couch. He misses and he hears the tell-tale sound of the phone breaking into a thousand pieces as it hits the floor instead. “Fuck.”

 


	2. Chapter 2

He goes back the next day at 3. A bit later than he’d planned since he had to go and buy a new phone first since the old one broke into a million pieces, and then when he was done with that he got hungry and had to stop by the grocery store and get something to ear.

It was old and mostly useless anyway, the phone, so he’s not exactly heartbroken by the change. He can’t understand how to use it, though, and hasn’t been able to do anything with it other than put his mother’s phone number in his contact-list. Fuck these new phones, they’re damn near impossible to operate unless you’re sixteen-years-old and into that kind of stuff.

He huffs to himself, rounds the corner and walks on until he reaches the door to the _Honeysuckle._

The _Old Rose_ , as Lee had called it, welcomes him with its merry jingle and he couldn’t care less that he’s looking like an idiot on happy pills – his grin is practically reaching his ears – because he has finally found the _perfect coffee shop_.

He’s got a place now where he feels so utterly welcome and at home that he’s almost sure that he might never go back to Auckland again - except to visit his family, of course; but he knows he could never live somewhere he couldn’t visit the _Honeysuckle_ whenever he wanted. His mother wouldn’t be happy if she knew he was thinking that, but it’s so true and the place is so great that he can’t even bring himself to care.

-

Richard, the slightly taller one with the kind eyes, is behind the counter when Dean walks in. He whips his head around when he hears the bell, a smile creeping unto his lips.

“Hello, Dean,” he says in a tone that suggests they’ve known each other for years, and gives him that smile good friends often greet one other with when they’re happy to see each other again. Oh, man, this place is just … brilliant.

“Hey, Richard, how’s it going?” Dean asks because he genuinely wants to know and thinks he might be in the process of becoming a regular – the least he can do then is make conversation with the baristas. He’s sort of hoping they’re becoming friends, as well, because both Richard and Lee seems like the sort you’d want to be friends with.

Richard huffs and his shoulders slump down a little, but the smile is still in place, albeit less bright. “Had a bit of a mishap earlier this morning,” he tells him, looking unsure as to whether or not he should be sharing this information.

“Oh?” Dean asks and it sounds almost too worried in his own ears, for whatever reason; he feels like he comes off as too interested and prying; he’s not even sure if he should be asking about it, based on Richard’s brief moment of hesitation. “What happened?” Yeah, well. His mother always said he asked too many questions as a child and it has likely become a primary aspect of his personality at this point.

Richard looks away for a brief second before his eyes find Dean’s again, a half-laugh escaping his lips. He gestures towards the espresso machine and his body language reveals that he’s still a bit frustrated about what had happened. He clenches his hands where they’re resting on top of the counter and sets his jaw.

“The bloody bastard stopped working this morning and the line went on for fucking ever, it was probably all the way out the door and halfway down the street. Lee’s the only one who knows how to fix it and he’s not here today, so I got a bit … grumpy.” From the way he looks away as he says it makes Dean think that Richard got a bit more than just ‘grumpy’.

Dean raises one eyebrow at the sudden and unexpected use of profanity and gives him a pointed look, shifting his stance to make himself appear as a strict teacher scolding a student for lying to him. “Oh wow, yeah that-that’s completely possible.” It should be disconcerting how easy he finds it to tease Richard; it does feel like they’ve known each other for far longer than one day. _Has it really been just one day? Seems like years, rather._

Richard sighs, but his lips are quirking into a bigger grin now, “Ok, maybe it didn’t happen quite like that, but it certainly felt that way – the line was almost at the door and the customers were all stressed and wanted their caffeine fix, and I was all alone in here. It was a nightmare.” He scratches the back of his neck nervously before continuing. “I can’t remember it ever being so stressed in here before. It’s working now, though,” he says and looks back at the machine, muttering something that sounds like ‘ _fucking useless piece of shit’_ under his breath.

Dean can’t help it, he starts laughing and luckily for him, Richard laughs too - after a moment of looking slightly taken aback and confused, though. “I’m-I’m sorry, but, um, really glad it’s up again. I need my fix, too.”

At that Richard’s eyes widen and he breathes a laugh into his hand, looking troubled, like he has forgotten about something essential, “Oh fuck, I forgot to ask! What can I get you, Dean?”

He smiles and tells him it’s no trouble; he does enjoy talking to people after all. He looks over at the blackboard-sign for the _Today’s Special_ and nods; it definitely sounds delicious, the _Warm Tasty Liquid_ , or, ‘ _half-caf double caramel latte with cinnamon sprinkles’_ , as it says in the description.

“Today’s special?” he asks, lips quirking into a wry grin as he points at the blackboard.

Richard peeks over at it and sighs, gently shaking her head. “Lee,” he offers as explanation and Dean nods and understands, which in itself is a bit weird, but he tries to let it go because how can he understand the minds of these people when he only met them yesterday? Maybe it’s all still a dream and he’s lying in his narrow bed home in his flat on _Honeybine Lane._

“I’ll have one of those and a slice of the apple pie,” Dean says a moment later, shifting his weight, trying to get his mind off of the possibility that this might all be a dream. If it is, he hopes he never has to wake up.

Richard offers another smile as he takes Dean’s order, pushing buttons on the machine until it starts spewing out the specific ingredients to his drink. Then he pulls a tray of apple pie out from the pastry dish and cuts him a slice. “Here you go, Dean.”

“Thank you,” he says and grins before sliding back to the table he had been sitting at the day before. He brings his laptop out of the bag and places it beside the cup on the table, feeling pretty confident that he’s going to get some writing done, though the chances are his brain’s still clogged up like a bucket of cement left to dry ups in the sun.

Maybe he should just stop trying to breathe life into something that has been dead for years and just come up with something completely different. Hopefully something that hasn’t got anything to do with boats and water and clichés, and unnecessary spouts of drama thrown it to create some sort of action.

As he’s waiting for his laptop to start up he takes to look around the shop just to see if it’s all the same, not that he’s expecting it not to be. There are more people in here today, though, and for a moment he allows himself to – not stare - study them and try to figure out what their story is, but before he can do much of anything he’s startled out of his musings by the shrill sound of his new phone ringing. It’s one of those standard ring tones - that loud, shrill ‘ _RRRING’_ that ends up resonating through your head for minutes afterwards.

He releases a groan and fumbles to get it out of his pocket, bobbling too much in his haste to make that dreadful noise stop that he almost drops it again. A smile manages to fight its way through his frown when he sees the caller-id, though, and he answers the phone as soon as he’s got a decent grip on it.

“Hi, Mum.”

 _“Dean,”_ she says, smile in her voice, and the conversation that follows is a mush between her wanting him to call more despite the fact that they talked _yesterday_ , catching him up on what’s happening home in New Zealand, and wanting to know more about the fellow that smiled at the bell.

Dean can’t do nothing else but indulge her and tell her that he hasn’t seen him since, but he appears to be a delivery boy of some sort so he’ll probably pop back in sooner or later.

She asks him when he’s going to talk to him, but when Dean keeps avoiding her questions she gives up and tells him Brett’s here if he wants to talk. Dean’s still not quite over their last argument about his choices in career-paths, so he tells her he has to go and dismissively hangs up as she tiredly gives one last effort trying to get him to talk to his brother already.

-

He sits there for a while, mindlessly sipping at his coffee and staring out the window at busy people walking and jogging about, taxis racing past and doves picking at the gravel on the sidewalk until he finishes the drink. His coffee is wonderful, and the pie even better, but he’s still as stuck as he’s been for the last three years.

It really shouldn’t be this hard to just _come up with something_ , but he just can’t get his fingers to do anything, and his imagination feels as if it’s slowly decomposing, and that’s the scariest feeling in the whole world. It’s all so fucking frustrating and _maddening_ , that when he eventually lifts his head up from his hands and opens a new _Word_ -document in pure desperation, the first thing that comes to mind is _apples_ , and all of a sudden he’s _got it_. After three years he is finally inspired again, and it’s all because of that one little word that shouldn’t mean anything.

“Fuckin’ really?” he mutters to himself and starts typing. It’s a slow going, but at least it feels like he’s gotten his bloody inspiration back. A small portion of it, at least, but it’s a part big enough to get him started.

He writes and drinks more coffee and gets another slice of apple pie until it finally stops and he can’t write any more. It’s been two hours, he learns when he checks the time. His back is sore and he’s written thirty pages, but he’s happier than he’s been in a long time. Fighting the impulse to call his mother and tell her about it he snaps the lid of the laptop shut and tosses it into the bag.

“Richard, I’m off,” he says as he’s walking down from his table and salutes Richard once he sees him.

Richard returns the gesture awkwardly with a confused look on his face. “What? Are you going already?” he takes a second to check his watch, as if he knows that Dean would’ve normally stayed longer than this.

“Yeah,” Dean nods apologetically and gestures towards his shoulder-bag. “Got work to do.”

“Alright. See you tomorrow, yeah?” Richard says and raises his eyebrows, leaning his hands down on the desk.

“Definitely,” Dean answers with a smile and walks out, giving the _Rose_ a brief look before it disappears behind the top of the door as it closes.

-

Two minutes later he’s home at the flat and running up the stairs like there’s a rabid dog on his heels, trying to get in as quickly as possible so he can continue writing while the idea is still fresh. He has no idea what gave him this particular idea for a story - after all this time of not getting _anything_ done - but somehow he feels like it’s the _Honeysuckle_ that should be thanked for it. If not that, then Aidan’s perfect apple pie.

He keeps the ideas running in his head as he fumbles with the keys and mutters dialogues to himself as he sets up the laptop again, doing everything he can so he doesn’t forget a word of what he thought up on the way home.

This time there’s no momentary blockage and there are no interruptions; only the beautiful perpetual flow of inspiration. He ends up writing through the night and wakes up the next day at noon with a bad crick in his neck and drool down his chin, his thin woollen blanket twisted in his legs. He goes back to the café only because he promised Richard and doesn’t stay longer than an hour, passing the time by chatting with Richard and Lee, scribbling in his notebook and staring out the windows as he’s munching on carrot-cake.

His mother will be mad at him for not bothering to call, but he thinks she would understand. He goes right home after that and writes until his back hurts and he has to go to work.

***

It’s been raining for two weeks straight. Not that that is a surprise – he’s in London in the middle of October for fuck’s sake; that sort of thing is to be expected. But two weeks? Fourteen fucking days and not a single blue dot in the sky, nor stream of sunshine through the clouds, or even a goddamn pause in that constant dripping Dean’s afraid is going to flood the entirety of England and put it on the list of lost empires, right next to Atlantis.

True, they get tons of rain in New Zealand, too, but they have tall mountains that had quelled Dean’s fear of the entire thing sinking into the ocean. London hasn’t got any mountains. It’s got pickle-shaped skyscrapers and huge-as-fuck Ferris wheels and lots of bridges, and the _Honeysuckle_ , and fellow bell-lover and baker Aidan Turner. But no mountains.

 _Aidan Turner._ Dean still hasn’t got himself to talk to him yet, and his brother and friends back in New Zealand would give him a look and shake their heads and call him a pansy, but Dean doesn’t give a fuck. He’s _going_ to talk to him, but not until he knows what to say, and he’s gotten more information on him from Lee - who seems uncommonly enthusiastic to share private information about his friend to total strangers.

Not that Dean is a total stranger, at least not to Lee.

He decides that a few more days of careful planning – not that he hasn’t had enough of those already – is required before sharing words with the baker, so he isn’t going to do anything yet. It all needs to be perfect. And he has to give a good first impression, too.

He sighs to himself and takes another sip of his bitter coffee. He’s sitting by his tiny kitchenette table in his tiny flat, staring out the window at the perpetually grey sky and falling rain. It’s boring and he can’t even go outside to take any pictures because his camera would get wet, and his jacket would get soaked, and he’d get cold and shivery. No. He shakes his head; not going out until it’s all blue sky and sunshine again. He hasn’t even been to the café for three days, he can feel the beginning a withdrawal coming on if the deluge doesn’t stop soon.

And the rain does stop – much quicker than he had imagined because two days later the sun is shining like it’s the middle of July and there’s not a single white dot marring the clear blue sky.

He gets up, makes himself a cup of his own stale and barely drinkable coffee, grabs his camera and goes out. This time he’s got a map, a paper-cup with latte from the _Honeysuckle_ , and a plastic bag full of old loaves of bread, not quite sure where the sudden urge to feed wild birds came from.

He decides, on a whim, to go to Green Park. He heard Richard and Lee chatting about having been there and fed the ducks and the squirrels, and then something else, but Dean had stopped listening to them at that point because they were busy kissing instead of talking.

So he’s walking through the streets trying to find the quickest way to Green Park, dodging puddles that still hasn’t dried in the sun, and lifting his camera up to his eyes taking pictures of just about everything.

He gets a couple good ones of an old man in a hat and a large moustache walking out of telephone-box, looking at his pocket-watch with a tiny smile on his face. He stops at a street-corner and snaps about ten pictures of a fat cat sleeping in the middle of the sidewalk; white and adorable and covered with large black spots.

Maybe he should get a cat. Living by himself in the flat can get rather lonely, if he’s being honest with himself. Not that he hasn’t got friends; he considers Peter is friend, and Lee and Richard, and that guy Adam that he’s working with at the restaurant. A cat, though. A cat would be nice.

He takes a couple more of the cat, now with one lazy eye open giving him a flat, annoyed look, and walks on towards the park.

Green Park happens to be only a short walk from his flat, no more than ten minutes, and when he arrives there he finds himself smiling so wide his cheeks start hurting because this place is so incredibly beautiful.

Tall, thick trees are spread over a large green field, and there is a body of water on which the closest bank is lined with low-hanging green branches of a tree-species Dean has never seen before. The water itself is full of birds swimming about, bobbing on the water. Ducks, mostly, and some geese and a couple of swans.

He walks further in on the narrow gravel-path and is just too late to get his camera ready for when a squirrel runs over the road, right in front of his feet. “Wow,” he breathes as he looks around. The park is still lush and green, like the whole place has been covered by a bubble and protected against the harsh coming-winter weather.

There’s still a bit of dew in the grass and there are tiny puddles in the path and along the short wire-fence separating him from the water, but otherwise there’s not a single sign of it being close to November.

He soon finds a bench that gives him perfect view of the ducks in the water and the trees beyond it on the a little green hillside overgrown with colourful flowers. It really feels like stepping into another world; ten seconds ago he was walking through the biggest city he’d been in yet and now he’s sitting on a little bench surrounded by large trees and wild animals. He lifts up his camera can’t stop taking pictures of just everything he sees.

There’s an old lady walking a huge black dog behind him on his right, a girl sitting with her back against a tree reading a book, and a young man with dark curly hair feeding the ducks-- _wait a minute_.

Dean lowers the camera, frowns, and takes a closer look at the young man three paces away from him. He can’t see his face, but there’s no doubt in his mind that that’s the baker; Aidan Turner from the _Honeysuckle._

Aidan Turner is here and he is feeding _ducks_! For a long moment he’s as confused as he can remember ever being until he remembers that, of course, Aidan lives in London, too; it’s really not that extraordinary running into him in a place like this.

But still, Dean can only sit there, speechless without moving, and watch him. He can hear Aidan laughing, chuckling to himself as two brown ducks fight over the last piece of bread. That’s when Dean picks his camera back up and snaps a couple more pictures – telling himself he’s not being a creepy stalker. It’s not really helping.

He’s also very busy contemplating whether or not he should walk up and introduce himself, and if that would be considered creepy or inappropriate, as he looks through the pictures, when a shadow passes over his face and stops for a brief second before it passes and a large something settles on the bench beside him.

He turns around, expecting to find, well, anything other than what he does - Aidan. Clad in a bright green t-shirt, an open plaid shirt and worn jeans. He’s smiling that bright made-of-sunshine smile of his and looks straight at Dean like they’re old friends finally seeing each other again.

“Hullo!” he greets and thrusts his arm forth so fast Dean nearly startles enough to fall right off the bench.

“Hi,” Dean stutters back and shakes his hand; big and warm and soft and Dean would be lying if he said he didn’t want to hold it forever. He tries not to give a whimper of disappointment when they let go of each other and puts his focus on trying to fit the lens-cap back onto his camera before he pushes it back into the camera-bag. His hands are shivering enough to make that task a particularly hard one, but he manages to put it in without dropping it.

“Sorry if I startled you, but I recognized you from the _Honeysuckle._ Saw you the other day and thought I’d come over and say hi,” Aidan explains two seconds later. He says something else, too, but Dean is too busy trying to replay the way Aidan said _Honeysuckle_ in his head, to pay much attention.

 _Honnysockle. Honnysockle. Honnisoockle?_ He was never any good at replicating accents anyway. It’s a bit upsetting - he rather liked the way Aidan said it.

It takes him a short awkward silence to be reminded that he should probably answer him. “Yes, yes, I-uh, I saw you, too. Delivering the … things.” _Jesus Christ, Dean O’Gorman, you should be ashamed of yourself._

He can feel his ears starting to go red and feels the need to apologize or phrase his answer better when he gets interrupted by Aidan’s laugh; it’s beautiful and clear and it sounds like summer, and Dean sort of feels like a loser thinking this, but he knows that there isn’t much he wouldn’t do just to hear that sound again.

Dean stops short and sighs. Is he really that far gone already? He is, and not even the tiniest bit embarrassed by it. _Ok, maybe he is, maybe he’s a lot embarrassed by it._

“Yeah, me an’ my gran’mother, we run this little bakery with a coupla friends and cousins not far from the _Honeysuckle_. Started deliverin’ to ‘em ‘bout three years ago, I think,” Aidan slurs and leans back heavily against the bench, long legs stretched out in front of him and arms crossed loosely over his stomach. He’s looking out over the clear water, eyes following a large white swan swimming lazily past them, snapping at the smaller birds in its way.

“You’re good,” Dean finds himself saying. “At the baking. You’re really good.”

Aidan turns towards him and chuckles again and it’s not October in London anymore, it’s June and they’re sitting by the docks in the golden evening-sunlight at Dean’s grand-uncle’s beach house three hours outside of Auckland.

“Cheers, man. I’ll be sure to give Nanna yer compl’ments.”

Dean wants to say _no, I was talking about you,_ but he doesn’t. He just hums and leans back and watches the birds splashing near the bank and the doves looking for food in the short grass.

“Shoulda brought more bread,” Aidan mutters after a moment and Dean is suddenly reminded of his own bag of loaves.

He risks a glance over at Aidan before leaning down to pick it up. “I brought some myself actually-,”

“Ya did?”

Dean hawks. “Yeah, was gonna use it to get them closer so I could take pictures. You’re welcome to give it to them. I think I’ve got enough of them anyway.” He holds the bag out for Aidan to take, but he doesn’t grab it, he just looks at him with something that isn’t too far from wonder in his eyes, making Dean’s cheeks go pink again.

And just when Dean is about to take it back, feeling embarrassed, Aidan graciously accepts it. “Nice, man. But we’ll do it together, come on,” he smiles and jumps back off the bench and doesn’t wait for Dean to give his answer before he’s grabbing his hand and pulling him up, too.

At this point Dean is entirely too flummoxed to do anything other than just stand there in front of the bench for a bit because Aidan Turner just grabbed his hands and said they’d feed the ducks together. Which, isn’t really that incredible - the bag of bread _was_ Dean’s after all, but it’s still so fucking awesome and, _wow_ , how is he going to be able to do this without shamelessly flirting with the gorgeous Irish-man?

He eventually gets his legs moving and settles on trying to not give too much away about this whole _I’m starting to really like this guy_ -thing. Aidan is standing two paces away with his long arm down the bag trying to fish out pieces of bread, slim waist drowned in the loose plaid, long legs and dirty sneakers. Dean finds himself smiling and walks over to join Aidan, who turns around with a big goofy grin on his face and hands him half a piece of bread crust before tossing a handful of crumbs towards the swans out on the lake.

And that’s how Dean O’Gorman finds himself standing beside this gorgeous, gorgeous man, tossing bread at birds in Green Park. Not at all what he had expected to happen when he’d thought about what his stay in London might be like. It’s strange and sort of surreal, in the _whoa, this was never supposed to happen, right?_ kind of way.

He’s not complaining, though. Especially not when Aidan bumps their shoulders together and smiles and laughs and calls Dean ‘mate’, and talks about his grandmother and how they got in touch with Richard and Lee, and all these new recipes that he’s been meaning to try out.

He talks, and gesticulates, and even his words – totally normal words - are turning out to be some of Dean’s new favourite things. Aidan goes on about their little bakery and how his grandmother was the one that got him into it in the first place. He asks a lot of questions, too, and for once Dean doesn’t get annoyed at the speed and frequency Aidan spews them out.

_"What’s that you got there? A camera? Nice. You take a lot of pictures, then? You a photographer?”_

_“Hey, what flower do you reckon this is? Nice colour, yeah? Bet Lee woulda loved a bouquet of these in the café. Maybe I should give Richard a few suggestions for_ _Valentine’s next year.”_

_“What do you think about apple tarts? Thought I’d make ‘em and bring ‘em over next week. I’ve only tasted ‘em once or twice and I quite liked them.”_

He asks so many, so fast that Dean sometimes doesn’t get time to answer one before another comes along. It’s hard to mind much, though, because Aidan never stops smiling and chuckling and patting Dean on the back when he says something funny.

“So where’re you from, Dean?” Aidan says when they’re packing up and on their way out of the park again. Dean hasn’t looked at his watch yet, but he reckons they’ve been there for close to three hours. He picks up his phone to check and is oddly disappointed to find that it’s only been forty minutes. “Australia?”

Dean shakes his head. “Close, but no cigar.”

Aidan laughs. “New Zealand?”

“There you go,” he grins back and nudges his shoulder against Aidan’s, albeit a bit unsurely; because somehow that is Aidan’s thing, and it feels sort of weird being the one doing it now.

“Yer not gonna make me guess which city, right? I don’t know shit about anything further south than Brighton, so prepare to be disappointed.”

Dean laughs and scratches the back of his neck, shoving his other hand down the front pockets of is red racket. “I’m from a city called Auckland.”

“Auckland,” Aidan echoes to himself in that accent of his. “Why’d ya move, then? I mean it’s not exactly Italy up here. It rains nine months outta the year and hails the other three. It can’t be nicer up here than down there, I reckon?”

“I don’t know,” Dean says, and for once he’s nearly shocked by how true it is; he really has no idea why he chose England - no less London. It was just the first city he thought of that wasn’t Auckland. “It’s not that bad, though. I really like it.”

“Aye,” Aidan mumbles and Dean can hear the smile in his voice, telling him he’s quite fond of this place, too.

They walk together for few more minutes before they realise they’re going to have to go different ways. Dean finds he doesn’t like that idea and would’ve been inclined to follow Aidan around like a puppy for the rest of the day if that wasn’t considered creepy, or weird.

“I’ll, eh, I’ll see you around, yeah?” Aidan says and stops at a street corner. He jerks his head in the other direction of the one Dean is going to take and gives an apologetic smile.

“Yeah,” Dean breathes and tries not to sound too bothered by it.

Aidan shakes his hand, smiles, and walks off. He turns back around after a few paces and waves at him, wild curls twirling in the wind, smile so wide his eyes are just two narrow cracks under his thick eyebrows.

Dean waves back and sighs. He stands there for a few seconds and watches Aidan until he disappears behind a tawny brick building. “Fuck,” he mutters to himself as he turns to the left and walks back home, wondering if he should visit the _Honeysuckle_ again today or not.

He settles on _not_ and takes a walk over Tower Bridge instead. Halfway over on the way home it starts raining.

***

It isn’t until a couple of days later that Dean sees Aidan again. He’s still wearing a t-shirt – not the green one, this time it’s purple – but at least he has the common sense to put on a jacket. Dean isn’t usually one to be worried about ‘strangers’, so he tells himself it’s because of the pastries – if Aidan’s sick, he can’t bring over the cakes and pies and cookies and everything else that Dean loves so much.

Dean is sitting at his table, sipping hot chocolate and doodling on one of the pages in his notebook when he sees him, walking across the street with the usual two cardboard boxes in his arms. Dean keeps his eyes on him the whole time and smiles to himself when he sees Aidan’s grin as the bell greets him.

He can’t help but sit up a little straighter in his chair and try to appear as if he’s not staring. He tells himself he hasn’t been waiting for this since the first time he saw Aidan, or the time he _talked_ to Aidan, but even _he_ is not capable of that level of deception – least of all towards himself.

So, instead, he clutches the cup in both hands, brings it up to his lips and watches as Aidan walks over to the counter with two large boxes filled with the most delicious things, he’s sure. They don’t look heavy, but Dean saw how much the man had jammed in there the last time, and he knows for a fact that it’s heavier than it looks.

“Hey, Richard,” Aidan says as he lets the boxes fall onto the counter with a dull thud. He rubs his hands together – it’s chilly outside and they’re most likely cold – and straightens the deep blue jacket over his purple t-shirt.

“Aidan, hi,” Richard smiles and walks over to him, the desk the only thing that separates them. “I can’t wait to see what you’re bringing in today – one never knows with you.” In some way it sounds as if he’s being scolded, like Aidan has the habit of telling them he’s bringing over chocolate cake and apple tarts when in reality his boxes are filled with scones and strawberry-filled cupcakes. The thought makes Dean smile, but he tones it down immediately in fear of being thought a weirdo that sits all by himself and grins at adorable strangers.

Aidan ducks his head ever so slightly and Dean thinks he may be blushing, but he can’t be sure. Either way it’s endearing. “I actually found a new recipe for a chocolate cake that I haven’t made before,” Aidan informs him excitedly around a grin two seconds later and shucks his hands down the back pockets of his jeans, his shoulders rising slightly, showing off his poorly contained enthusiasm.

“Oh,” Richard says as he’s moving the boxes away from the counter. “What’s it called?”

“The Devil’s Chocolate cake,” Aidan replies and looks more serious than Dean’s ever seen him. It doesn’t last long, though, after only a moment the smile is creeping back onto his lips.

“That’s … original,” Richard says and half-laughs. “How is it?”

Aidan shrugs and chuckles, the warm smile still there on his lips. “Chocolate-y, I guess,” he laughs, “With a hint of coffee. There’s a lot of dark, strong chocolate in there, but the sweet filling between the layers and on top creates a perfect balance.”

Richard nods, “Sounds like something Graham would like. He’s all for dark and strong stuff.”

Aidan agrees wholeheartedly with that statement and Dean sits there, frowning, wondering who the hell this Graham person is and whether or not he works here, or if he’s a close friend or … if he’s in a relationship with Aidan. He tosses the last possibility out of his head as fast as it came in, dismissing that idea entirely.

After chatting with Richard for a couple more minutes – Dean tells himself he’s not being creepy with his staring – Aidan leaves and strolls over to the door, but just before he opens it he casts one last look into the café, his eyes landing right on Dean.

Everything stops. Dean’s arm is halfway raised, holding his coffee-cup in mid-air. He attempts to smile back and feels his lips shaking, but he can’t find it in himself to care – Aidan can’t see it from that distance anyway. Slowly lowering the cup back on to the table he sends Aidan a little wave. The Irishman spends a moment staring at him before he grins broadly, waves, and walks out of there.

Dean spends the next two minutes trying to relearn how to breathe properly and can only come to the conclusion that maybe he wasn’t being as subtle with his staring as he thought he was. That has to be the only reason Aidan would turn back to look back at him, right? There can’t really be anything else. But how did he know that Dean was staring in the first place? Does he have eyes on the back of his head? _Did Richard tell him?_

Richard probably told him. Not that Dean knows him that well, but it sounds like something Richard would do.

Either way it’s unsettling as hell and Dean doesn’t dare to do much else while he’s there than munch on his pie, take absent sips of his hot chocolate and write down half-coherent and nowhere-going sentences in his notebook.

He can’t keep Aidan out of his head for long, though, and is too distracted to get much more done so he packs up and leaves earlier than he usually does – half in fear of Aidan coming back, or just tired of sitting there and not accomplishing anything, he has no idea. And quite frankly, he has no real desire to find out either, so he just flips his notebook closed, caps his pen and throws it all into his shoulder bag.

Richard says goodbye to him and Dean can see the question wanting to leave his lips, asking him why he’s leaving so early again since Dean usually stays there for hours every time he visits. He doesn’t offer him an explanation as he walks past the counter, but sends him a tiny smile and a nod, trying very hard not to feel like he is being a real dick.

The image of Aidan smiling at him dances through his head the whole way back to his flat.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> let me know if you find any typos, i'm horrible at finding them
> 
> also very sorry for taking so long writing this

There’s something so beautiful about London that’s sort of indescribable, unless you’ve been there and knows what’s being talked about, or you are presented with appropriate reference material.

Now, Dean has tried verbally depicting London to his mother over the phone, quite a few times, but as much as he tries to give accurate representations of everything he’s seen and smelled and tasted so far, it never seems to suffice. Sometimes it feels too much like trying to describe the moon and the stars to someone who’s never dared to look up.

He’s sent her a couple of photos by email, but he’s pretty sure she doesn’t know how to work the computer in order to see it. He sent them to Brett as well, just to be sure, but he hasn’t heard back from either of them in a couple of days so it has probably escaped their notice, all of it.

It should irk him, but he doesn’t mind. If there’s one thing this city is particularly good at it’s the ability it has to help you forget about things like that.

Well, most things. Aidan Turner, the baker, seems rather unwilling to leave Dean’s thoughts at all, which results in many frustrated hours before the computer trying to write about someone that’s _not_ Aidan. Someone that doesn’t _look_ like Aidan, or _sound_ like Aidan. Someone whose stupid, dark curls doesn’t tangle with each other in the mild afternoon breeze of a Sunday afternoon in August.

Dean sits back in his office chair and drags a frustrated hand over his face. Just when he thought he’d gotten his drive back it’s gone and replaced itself with the picture of a person he has no chance of getting with. He doesn’t even know Aidan! So how come he is everything Dean can think about? “Fuck,” he mutters and sighs, staring emptily at the laptop screen as he considers whether or not another cup of tea would get the ball rolling again.

He figures it will, and goes to make himself one. He puts the kettle on, ignoring the blue sparkle coming out of the socket when he jots it in and reminds himself once again to get an electrician up here to take a look at it. He should probably phone Peter and have him come up and look at it himself, but not today. Today’s reserved for ‘stewing in own misery’, and ‘try not to think too much about that baker guy’.

When the water is nearly done boiling he fishes a new cup down from the cupboard since he’s too lazy and frustrated to go back into the living room to fetch the used one. He gets a teaspoon and a little plate, and finds the new jar of honey he bought the other day at the farmer’s market.

Honey, he’s found, works better than sugar when it comes to tea. It gives it that wild and naturesque taste he fancies so much. He’s also pretty sure ‘naturesque’ isn’t a word, but he amuses himself with the thought that he can’t quite call himself a writer before he’s come up with his own word.

Then he finds the little paper box of _rooibos_ he keeps in the second drawer beside the fridge, along with his _earl grey_ , _chamomile_ , and _four red fruits_. The smell of it reminds him of Christmas and it’s as he’s taking another sniff of his steaming cup of _rooibos_ tea that he gets hit with the first wave of homesickness.

He frowns. Back when he was a kid he rarely got homesick. In fact he can’t even remember the last time he was, and wonders if he can get Brett to learn his mother how to _skype_ right now, or if he should just phone her and do it himself.

“No, fuck that,” he breathes and does his best to ignore the sudden hollow feeling in his chest as he sits down in front of his laptop again. He’s got his mind off of Aidan, but it’s even worse now, and if he could’ve chosen, he’d pick moping over perfect Irish bakers over missing his Mum and Dad (and even Brett) on other side of the bloody planet any day.

The tea (and homesickness) seems to help in some way, though, because one hour later, when he closes the lid of his laptop and leaves to go food shopping, he’s got another ten pages down and comes to find that he doesn’t really miss his folks back home as much as before. There’s still this subtle nagging in the back of his head though, that keeps him thinking about Auckland and his old neighbourhood and the look on his mother’s face whenever he came over uninvited for dinner; soft, impressed smile and loving eyes.

Frowning, he picks up his scarf and red jacket – the temperatures had finally caught up with the fact that it is November; a cold wind has been gushing through the city for the last three days and it seems in no hurry to stop. He spends a moment looking at his hat, but decides against it; the food store is only a few hundred meters down the road, anyway – he’s not likely to catch a cold or ear infection in that short time.

***

The old bell above the door to the _Honeysuckle_ greets him with its usual merry jingle when he walks in later that afternoon. He’s still feeling a bit weird from having been away from home for so long, but he’s been rather good at ignoring it all day.

Lee is standing behind the counter when he comes in, or rather, _sitting_ on it. Reading a magazine. Dean finds he’s surprised at _not_ being surprised at the baristas using the counter as a chair, and gives Lee what he hopes is a cheerful ‘hello’ when he walks up to him.

“Ah, Dean! Hi, there,” Lee smiles and looks up from the cross-word he was filling out, pen twirling between his fingers with practised ease. He hops down off the counter on the ‘wrong’ side and gives Dean’s shoulder a pat before leaning back towards it and folding his arms over his chest. “How are you today? Still on writing that thing of yours?”

“Ehm,” Dean starts and is about to answer that ‘yes, I am’, but then he remembers that he hasn’t actually told anybody about the ‘thing’ he’s writing, so how could Lee know? “How’d you know that?” he asks instead and clears his throat. He thinks he has started sweating as well for some reason, and can’t decide which foot he means to settle his weight on.

Lee grins back at him, unfazed and good-humoured as always, “I just see you sitting there, typing all the time, so I figured it’s a book or something. Am I right?”

The only reason he’s telling Lee this, Dean decides, is because Lee has this ability to transform himself into a twelve year old innocent little boy with just a slight raise of his shoulders and hitching eyebrows. It’s not hard to see what got Richard intrigued, not when the guy has a face like that.

“Yeah, it’s this book I’ve sorta been workin’ on for a while,” Dean breathes and tries to laugh, like it’s not a big deal. He fails, at least he’s pretty sure he fails because Lee’s eyebrows are doing that thing they do when he’s talking about something serious. He’s pretty sure this guy shows his emotion through his bloody eyebrows and Dean doesn’t think it as weird as he thinks he should.

“Oh, what’s it about?” Lee asks with his serious eyebrows set.

This is the question he’d hoped he wouldn’t get. The story is still developing and he hasn’t come up with proper names for his characters, nor where it takes place, but he has a pretty good idea of how he wants it to go. “Apples,” is what comes out of his mouth, and it takes a moment of silence, in which Lee’s eyebrows turns to frowning, before Dean catches up with his treacherous mouth.

“Apples?” Lee asks around a tiny smile, as if he’s not sure if it’s a joke, or not. At least he’s not laughing.

“Um, yeah, well,” Dean mutters and mentally curses himself and everything around him. “An apple farm.”

“An apple farm,” Lee echoes and crosses his arms over his chest, a soft smile playing on his lips. “How’d you come up with that? Did you live on one before you moved here?”

Dean shakes his head and finds now that he’s started, he doesn’t really want to stop talking about it. Maybe it’s all those years of Brett putting his work down, and his mother not prompted him to tell her about it, and now Lee being the first person genuinely interested that makes him want to sit them both down so he can lay it all out for him.

“No,” he says and wonders how to say ‘I saw an apple and it just came to me’ without sounding weird. “I-uh, I just, it just came to me.”

Lee smiles and nods and looks like he understands everything Dean’s going on about. It’s incredibly refreshing. “That’s good,” he grins. “Maybe we should get Aidan to bring in some more Apple cakes tomorrow, keep your creative juices flowing.”

Dean laughs and heartily agrees and decides to come in tomorrow, early enough to see Aidan with his boxes crossing the street, and hear him yell at Lee for ordering more cake so late in the evening, that if fucked with his plan.

“So what can I get you, Deano?” Lee eventually asks and it’s so sudden that it makes Dean jump, having somehow completely forgotten where he was standing.

“Um, hot chocolate, thank you.” It’s cold outside. Hot chocolate is allowed on cold Tuesday afternoons. “Cream and cinnamon on top. And lots of it,” he adds and sends Lee and answering smile over the counter.

***

It’s a Tuesday, two weeks later, when Adam, a guy he’s gotten to know from his job as a waiter, shows up at Dean’s apartment wearing his beanie and thick scarf, cheeks already rosy from having walked for the half hour it takes him to get to Dean’s place from his own. The weather channel had predicted a cold breeze today, maybe even some rain, but since Adam is not soaked to be bone Dean decides to take that as another miscalculation on their part. And not surprisingly so, either.

As always, his friend walks right in and toes his shoes off _after_ he’s trodden past the doormat. “Dean?”

“In here!” Dean answers from the living room where he’s lounging on the couch, having come across an old episode of _Poirot_ he hadn’t seen before. It’s done now, though, so he switches the TV off and sits up to greet his friend.

“Are you ready?” Adam says from the narrow doorway, tufts of hair sticking out from his blue beanie, an excited grin on his face. He adjusts the glasses on his nose and puts his hands into his jacket pockets.

“Yep,” Dean replies and jumps up off the couch. “About damn time you get to see this place, mate,” he teases around a smile as he walks Adam back out into the tiny hallway where he keeps his boots and jacket. He ponders for a moment before deciding to put on his hat as well. It’s the middle of November, and middle of November in London means Cold.

Adam’s only response to that is a chuckle as they walk beside each other out on the street, course set for the _Honeysuckle._

“So, How’s your family back home in New Zealand?” Adam asks as they exit Honeybine Lane and gracefully hops over a manhole cover. The third one so far.

“You know you can just step on ‘em, right?” Dean huffs and trods on one on principle.

“One day, my friend,” Adam says and turns towards Dean with his rosy cheeks and clattering teeth, “You’re gonna step on one and you’re gonna fall right through, and you know where I’ll be?”

Dean scoffs, but avoids the next one and tries not to make it look like he did it on purpose. “Helping me up?”

“No,” Adam scoffs and takes a long step over another one. “I’m going to be standin’ over it, yelling ‘I fuckin’ told you so’. _Then_ I’m going to help you up.”

Dean decides not to say anything to that and leads then down the street, past the cute little flower shop on _Shire Road._

“How’s your folks back in New Zealand, Dean?” Adam asks again and nudges Dean in the arm. He skips over another manhole cover and Dean just sighs and decides not to bother about it anymore.

“Good. Everyone’s good. Mum’s still asking and nagging about everything, though. As usual.”

Adam snorts, “Yeah, well, what the fuck is she gonna do, you just took off all of a sudden from what I understand.”

“Yeah.” He never felt regret for doing it either. Or maybe he just didn’t let himself feel it. There’s something heavy and hard settling in his chest now, though, and it feels an awful lot like shame. Maybe he should’ve let his family in on his plans a good long while before he left instead of throwing it in their faces two days before it happened.

“You’re a strange one, Dean O’Gorman. I don’t know if I could be seen hanging around with you, people might start avoiding me in fear of catching your crazy,” Adam declares after having heaved a long-suffering sigh. He turns towards Dean and laughs silently to himself, and takes a poorly executed swing around a light pole.

“Oh fuck off,” Dean mutters and shoves Adam not-very-gently into the brick wall of the building they’re passing.

“Mhm,” comes the response along with a little laugh as Adam straightens his jacket and shoves his hands into the pockets again.

“Whatever. Just go back to your Starbucks and live the rest of your life with the burning agony of not having been to the greatest place on Earth. Be my guest.”

“You should be a comedian.”

“Knew I’d chosen the wrong career-path.”

-

“Ah,” Dean hums and stops Adam by brushing his arm against him, “Here we are.” They’ve stopped just outside the _Honeysuckle_ , its reddish, tawny mortar walls in stark contrast to the grey and white buildings around it. The building is old and beautiful; it should’ve been on a Christmas card, Dean thinks, except there wouldn’t be much snow to show for it. Just petunias in the window sills and beautiful bells and smiling faces in the windows.

Adam stops abruptly and looks around, “What, this is it? This looks like the backside of that restaurant we work in, Dean.”

Dean frowns at his friend and shoves his hands down the pockets of his jeans, shielding them from the sudden cold. “What the fuck do you mean ‘this is it’? And this looks nothing like the back o’ _Fitzy’s_!”

"Well, I didn’t think it was this close, for starters,” he says around a hesitant smile and adjusts the hat on his head, looking like he’s a bit unsure of something. Dean ignores it.

“Yeah, well, I got lucky there,” he says and smiles because he knows just how _damn_ lucky he is. Moving all the way to London from Auckland was hard and being sort of friends with Adam has made it a hell of a lot easier to settle in.

The coffee shop has helped quite a bit, too, of course. _And Aidan_ , Dean would supply, had it not been for the fact that he hasn’t actually had more than one proper conversation with the guy. And he probably isn’t even gay, either.

“Let’s just get inside, ‘s fucking freezing out here,” Dean mutters and takes the last three steps over to the front door, which he opens as soon as he’s there, not bothering to check if Adam is still following him.

He opens the door and smiles at the familiar hollow _dong_ of the bell as he walks in. The warmth seeps through his clothes immediately, making him pause and close his eyes for a second at how good it feels.

A second later he hears Adam stomp through the door and then abruptly stop as well, for what Dean thinks might be for a different reason.

“Whoa,” Adam breathes and Dean turns around hoping to catch a sight of his friend’s reaction to this place, and as he thought, Adam’s eyebrows are so far up his hairline Dean’s not sure they’re ever going to come back down and his mouth is hanging open.

“Yep,” Dean agrees and pulls his hat off, stuffing it into his jacket pocket. A smile creeps unto his lips as he watches Adam flit his eyes around the entire place, trying to check out everything all at once by the looks of it.

“It’s beautiful in here,” Adam says, not looking at Dean because he’s still stroking every feature in there with his eyes, every tiny little detail absorbed and processed like he’s some kind of machine. Sometimes it’s a little bit creepy just how well Adam takes in things. “Look! Look at the tables, and the chairs-,”

Dean chuckles lightly and gives him a pat on the back, “I know.” He’s hoping the other costumers and the baristas he’s getting to know pretty well aren’t thinking anything weird about them … or just Adam, really. Who’s acting like a total freak right now and Dean sort of wants him to stop as soon as possible.

“Yep,” is all he says, awkwardly scratching his head as he subtly looks around to see if anyone’s noticed them – it doesn’t appear the be the case. Dean sighs.

They’re still standing just inside the door.

“I wonder what type of-,”

“Brazilian Walnut,” Dean cuts in with a grin before Adam can finish his question. He shrugs his jacket off too because now that he’s been standing here for a couple of minutes, it’s getting really warm compared to what it was like to walk all the way over here in five degrees, with a sly wind tearing at their jackets.

He looks at Adam and sees him grinning at him with this weird look in his eyes, half fascinated and half bemused. “Your level of weirdness never ceases to amaze me, Deano,” he says with feigned condescension and crosses his arms over his chest.

Dean huffs and turns around to walk further into the café, feeling like a cup of coffee would be much appreciated right about now. “Fuck off, I came here for coffee and you’re stalling.”

“I should take Martin here sometime. Right, Deano? He’d like it, he’s all about cakes and stuff,” Adam keeps babbling in the background and Dean knows better than to answer a man who’s talking to himself – especially when that man is Adam Brown. “Wow, check out those carvings on the table-legs! And the backs of the chairs, too! Oh my gosh-,”

Dean shakes his head and walks up to the counter where Lee is standing by the espresso machine, pushing buttons.

“Hey, I noticed the bell.” Adam has caught up with him now, but still sounds distracted by everything. A side look from Dean confirms that; he’s trying to decipher the coffee menu. _Good luck_ , Dean thinks after having tried to read Lee’s crooked handwriting for weeks – he still doesn’t know what it says.

“It’s fucking brilliant,” he replies, mostly to himself, and feels the edges of his lips curl into a soft smile just thinking about this place.

“Yes, it _is_ awesome, sorry for doubting you,” Adam says with mocked sincerity and holds a hand against his chest, over his heart. “I _know_ how much bells means to y-,”

“Shut up, you prick, or I’m banning you from this place,” Dean turns mid-step and points a finger at Adam with his giant glasses and striped knitted cardigan and hair still sticking out in every angle now that he’s taken his hat off.

“Like you have that power, you sod!” Adam laughs, pushing a tuft of hair back behind his ear. It springs back after a moment and despite how many times Adam tries to fix it, it always reverts to the state it wasin before Adam started tempering with it.

Dean growls and prays Adam won’t eat all the brownies just to be a dick because he really wants one of them today. He’d overheard a conversation last Friday between Aidan and Richard about how Aidan had been meaning to try out this new Brownie recipe, and that he’d bring it by on Monday – which was yesterday. Again, he doesn’t take pleasure in spying in on people’s conversations. Unless it’s about Aidan’s baking.

As long as it’s about Aidan Turner and his prowess in the culinary arts, Dean can’t quite make himself feel guilty for eavesdropping.

One might not think so, but Dean spends most of his time telling himself he’s not a creepy stalker. It doesn’t really help. Most of the time.

There’s no one at the counter so Dean just walks right up and nearly startles when Lee – who’d been standing over by the espresso machine just a minute ago – swiftly turns around and grins at him.

“Hey-,”

“Dean!” Lee almost shouts, opening his arms as if the sight of Dean in the _Honeysuckle_ is something that should be publicly announced and celebrated. Dean almost expects fireworks and glitter to come flying out of his sleeves. “Hey, man, how’ve you been? Haven’t seen ya for a couple of days.”

Dean laughs awkwardly and scratches at the back of his head, “I’m doing good, just needed some time off to rest, you know.”

Lee nods, friendly smile in place, his entire body says ‘I understand’, and Dean doesn’t know when this happened but he feels like he’s gained a new brother.

“How, eh, how’re you?”

“’s good, ‘s good,” Lee says, but then his face falls a little and Dean in the span of two seconds he goes from ‘coffee’ to ‘oh my god what happened to Richard, is he dead?!’.

“Richard’s down with the ‘flu though so he won’t be back to work for a couple o’ days. At least.”

Dean immediately relaxes and makes sure he doesn’t start smiling as he offers his sympathies, and just then remembers that Adam is also in the room. He looks back at him for a moment and sees him watching them with a half-confused, half-amused smile.

“He alright?” Dean then asks, turning back towards Lee, brows furrowing, and finds himself leaning a little closer to the counter.

Lee huffs, “Yeah, he got the mild one, fortunately. Stuck in bed for the time being. He’s a giant complainer, though he doesn’t really look it. I barely got any sleep last night at all.” Well, now that he mentions it, he does look a bit tired and worn.

Not for one single moment does Dean stop to take a second to figure out how, or when, he got so involved in these people’s lives since it feels like it has progressed so naturally. It’s only been five odd weeks since he found this place and he already knows the baristas better than he did some of his neighbours in Auckland.

“That sucks,” Dean says and shakes all thoughts of how weird – and nice – his life has become after he started coming here out of his head.

Lee hums in agreement and leans heavily against the counter. A barista in any other coffee shop than this one would’ve asked for their orders by now, but again, this one’s different. Dean doesn’t mind at all. He doubts anyone in here minds.

“So who’s filling in for him? I mean, it gets pretty busy here this time of day,” he asks because he genuinely wants to know. He’s gotten pretty familiar with seeing either Lee or Richard, or both, standing at the counter when he walks in every day. He can’t help but feel some sort of scepticism at the thought of some complete stranger – at least to himself – working here. They won’t know exactly how he likes his coffee, and they probably won’t be friendly enough to save him the last piece of brownie for when he comes in late.

“Graham,” Lee smiles and the name immediately triggers something in Dean’s mind – it has to be the same Graham Aidan and Richard were talking about a couple of weeks ago. “He just came back from Rome,” he adds, and there’s a tiny smirk on his lips now, like the thought of Graham being in Rome amuses him.

 “Rome?”

Lee shakes his head fondly, “He’s the travelling type. Been working here for about a year, but you haven’t seen him yet.”

Dean reacts as he thinks he should, with raised eyebrows and an approving nod, “Oh, that’s-that’s nice.”

“So,” Lee smiles just as the bell rings, meaning someone’s coming in, and he must’ve finally caught sight of Adam because his eyes immediately widens and his eyebrows goes up. “Whoa! Hey, haven’t seen you here before?”

Dean turns to watch Adam and sees the reminders of the amused smile on his lips, before he visibly startles with Lee’s sudden outburst.

“Hey,” Adam says when he shakes himself out of it and takes Lee’s hand. “I’m Adam and, no, never been here before.”

Lee purses his lips and frowns, but his eyes are still soft, “Tsk, shame.”

Adam laughs awkwardly and casts his eyes down for a moment, reminding Dean of a child caught doing something he shouldn’t. “Starting to get that,” he mumbles, barely loud enough for Dean to hear it.

“I’m Lee. It’s nice to meet you.”

“You too,” Adam nods, the smile creeping back onto his face. He tugs his scarf off and prods it into his right coat pocket, hawking at the following awkwardness seeing as the scarf is just a bit too large to fit into it. He pushes until it’s mostly in, making Dean’s stomach hurt from trying to hold in a laugh.

They both startle as Lee claps his hands together, “So, what can I get you? Usual for you, Dean, or would you actually want to try something else for a change?” his tone is playful and his posture open and friendly.

Adam laughs.

Dean sniggers quietly into his hand whilst trying his best to hide the blush rising up his neck. He mentally goes over all the different orders he’s managed to learn by heart – since trying to read the menu won’t accomplish anything other than a headache - and picks something normal enough so that he can drink it without feeling weird about it, and something comfortably far from what he usually orders – large cups of hot chocolates and cappuccinos with one extra shot of espresso, or regular black coffee, mostly – just to indulge Lee.

He settles on a mocha latte and tells him.

“Not too far off the map once you go, huh,” Lee laughs as he’s grabbing a cup and walks over to the espresso machine, colourfully nicknamed ‘The Bastard’, by whom Dean reckons must be Richard. “Alright,” he mutters, busy pushing buttons.

“I’ll have a regular coffee, thank you,” Adam answers when Lee asks, and then they both wait patiently by the counter while their cups get filled.

“Here ya go,” he says, a couple minutes later, and sets the two white cups down on the counter, a couple of soft _clonks_ as they hit the hard, dark wood of the desk, cups and platter clashing against each other. He then points at Dean and inclines his head towards the pastry section, “Anything to go with it?”

“I’ll just have a muffin. Surprise me,” Dean says, not even looking up, busy fishing his wallet out of his back pocket. He hears Lee ask Adam if he wants anything and, just as he predicted, Adam lets out a breath of pure astonishment as he takes in all the pastries behind the glass.

“Oh wow, these look absolutely brilliant,” he whispers and leans in to take a closer look at a few of them.

“I’ll be sure to compliment the baker,” Lee grins and brings out Dean’s muffin. He didn’t say what kind, but Richard knows he’s partial to blueberry, which is fortunately what he got since Lee has the habit of giving him something different every time, which should be annoying, but he doesn’t really mind, actually, since they’re all delicious anyway.

“I’ll have, umm,” Adam mutters, leaning forwards heavily as he studies the cakes and waffles and pies of all sorts.

“Take your time, Ads,” Dean mumbles and chucks the money he owes onto the counter, and then waits for Adam to make a goddamn order already, it’s not like he’s never going to step foot in this place ever again.

“I don’t know what to pick, it all looks so delicious.”

Dean pauses for a second and leans against the counter, taking a sip from his latte. He can see Lee grinning at Adam’s indecisiveness at the corner of his eye. “Try the fruitcake.”

Lee guffaws.

Adam doesn’t appear to have heard him, as he’s still looking them all over like a distressed child not able to make his mind up before mommy and daddy threatens to leave the toy-shop. “Umm, cake, please. Carrot cake,” he finally says and sends them both a smile.

Dean rolls his eyes and wanders over to his table, but he can feel the smile tugging at the corner of his lips anyway.

-

“So,” Adam asks once they’ve been sitting there for a while, having sips of their drinks and taken bites of their respective carrot cake and muffin – he looks entirely too smug and Dean immediately squints at him, slowly placing his cup back on the table.

“So?” he echoes and frowns at the wave of ‘impatient’ Adam is exuding right now.

“Which one is the bell-guy?” he asks, leaning over the table, eyebrows raised.

“Shh!” Dean immediately leans forward, too, and glares at him, looking past his shoulder quickly to see if Lee might’ve heard them – he hasn’t.

Adam voice immediately lowers, “Is he here?” he looks around, none too inconspicuous, and gives Dean a questioning look.

“No,” he whispers and fights the blush crawling back up his neck and cheeks, looking anywhere but Adam and his questioning eyes and smug grin.

“Do you know his name?”

Dean clears his throat and takes a sip of his mocha latte to buy himself more time. “Yes. His name’s Aidan.”

He’s glad Adam never asks _how_ he learned the guy’s name since the answer to that would be _listening in on other people’s conversations_ , and Adam would’ve never been able to stop torturing him about that one.

“Aidan?” Adam asks, frown in place on his face. “Is he from here, do you know anything about him?”

“Um, he’s from Ireland. Likes to bake. That’s about it, really.” He doesn’t say anything about them having fed the ducks together, and doubts he ever will. Somehow, that has become something precious and wonderful that he wants to keep to himself for ever.

Adam nods, “Sounds like an Irish name.”

“Yeah,” Dean says and can’t keep the smile away as he thinks back to the first time he saw him; wearing that god-awful pink t-shirt, carrying big boxes and yelling curse words at his employers.

“Wait, whaddya mean ‘it sounds Irish’? how is that any more Irish than fucking _Adam_ or _Dean_?”

The sigh Adam releases then is the most agonized sound Dean has ever heard in his whole life.

***

It’s Wednesday. It’s noon.

And Dean has been wringing his story-telling brain upside-down and inside-out trying to come up with good conversation starters and how to make good first-impressions, and generally just trying to find the right moment to strike up a conversation with Aidan since he woke up at eight.

Yeah, it’s not going too well. The problem is that either Aidan’s in a hurry, or busy conversing with people that are _not_ Dean O’Gorman … and Dean is always too much of a pansy to just walk over there and _talk to him_. If Adam was there, he’d punch him in the arm and give him one of those looks that just said ‘ _man, I don’t even know what to do with you’_.

As it so happens, the ‘talk to Aidan thing’, it’s a bit too spontaneous than Dean would’ve liked, and a hell of a lot less delicate than he’d hoped.

It’s a Monday and Aidan has just dropped off another couple of cardboard boxes with his baked goods, it’s raining sideways and it’ll probably continue to do so for at least a couple of more days, and Aidan is waltzing into the _Honeysuckle_ wearing a pair of worn-out jeans, a blue open plaid shirt and a thin grey t-shirt under that again.

Dean shivers just looking at him.

It all happens as Aidan’s walking further into the coffee shop, actually, with a cup of coffee in his hands, and he must’ve stepped on something and nearly tripped because before Dean knows it, Aidan’s cursing something terrible – more so than usual - and is vehemently shaking his hand.

Dean is out of his seat before he knows it and standing in front of Aidan, “Are you alright?”

“Ow, fuck,” is all Aidan has to say about that, looking down at his slightly shaking hand which is already showing signs of being scolded. The front of his grey t-shirt is stained with the warm coffee, as is his right thigh.

Dean winces and moves his arms out to grab a hold of Aidan’s shoulders like he want to hold him still and calm him down. He stops the movement halfway and brings them back to fold and unfold over his chest like he’s some kind of neurotic with no control over his own limbs. “D-do you need to see a doctor or something?” He has no idea if Aidan _should_ go to a hospital, all he knows is that his hand is turning pink and he’s in a lot of pain.

Aidan looks up, thick eyebrows knitted together, and Dean’s mouth goes dry simply because of how amazingly big and open and brown Aidan’s eyes are. “Hospital?” he asks and shifts his gaze back down to his hand to take another look at it. “Wh-no I don’t think so. Fucking hell, though, that hurt.”

“Um, here, sit down,” Dean says and he’s somehow got his hands on Aidan’s shoulders, and he’s steering him towards his table, _Dean’s_ table. He doesn’t even blink at the weirdness of this situation, or stop to appreciate how easy it is to hold onto the other man’s shoulders and guide him in the direction of his choosing.

“I’ll go get you some ice or something,” he adds once Aidan’s sitting down, and his hands feel as if they’re trembling with electricity.

Aidan groans and blows at his scolded hand. “Cheers, mate,” he mutters absentmindedly and hisses as he gently prods a finger to the burnt area.

“Y-yeah no problem,” he rattles off and turns around, half-jogging back to the counter where Lee is standing, hunched over it, reading something that looks an awful look like a _Batman_ -comic, but Dean hasn’t got time to take a closer look at that right now, although he’d really like to. On any other day, in another situation, he’d do it.

“Hey, buddy, refill already?” Lee greets him once he’s close enough, not looking up from the comic, and if the situation was any different he’d stop and wonder when exactly he and Lee became _buddies_. A tiny breeze of contentment brushes over him, but he ignores it for the time being and reminds himself that he has a hurt Irishman over in his corner by the window.

“Hey, uh, L-Lee,” Dean says uncertainly, unsure if he should return the sentiment or go ‘normal’. “Do you have some ice, by any chance?”

Lee frowns and looks up from the comic book, “Ice?”

“And maybe some painkillers if you’ve got ‘em. That guy burned his hand,” he replies hurriedly and gestures towards a hunched over Aidan Turner, from which faint growls and hisses seem to exude. He doesn’t say ‘Aidan’ because that would only imply that he has been listening in on his conversations with both Lee and Richard, and he really doesn’t want to come off as a creepy stalker.

Lee’s eyebrows go up and for a second he looks worried, “Aidan?”

Dean just nods.

Eventually, when he has explained their baker’s unfortunate predicament to a visually worried Lee, he gets the ice and painkillers and all but runs back to Aidan. “Here you go,” he says softly, handing it over.

“Ah, cheers,” Aidan grits through his teeth as he puts it over his hand and sends Dean a grateful smile. He pops the pills into his mouth and swallows them down with what’s left of his now-lukewarm coffee.

“No problem at all,” Dean mumbles and sits down opposite of Aidan. He spends a couple of moments staring at him, not even sure what to think anymore and cursing his brain for not coming up with _anything at all_ to say. Jesus, one would think he’s a goddamn school girl talking to her crush for the first time, or something. He’s a bit embarrassed for himself; this doesn’t usually happen.

“Y’know, I could give you a ride to the hospital, man, it’s no problem at all.” He doesn’t even have a car, why would he say that? Maybe he could get Adam to come down here and drive them both to the hospital. He might have to call in several hundred favors, but he reckons it could be done.

Aidan lets out a tiny laugh, wrinkles crinkling around his eyes, and Dean’s mind severs from its path again. “Don’t worry about it, I’m sure it’s fine,” he grits out as he closely inspects his hand. “Hurts like fucking hell, though.”

“Well, yeah, I can imagine,” Dean shrugs and stares perhaps a bit too long at Aidan slender wrist and pale fingers. He can almost imagine what it must be like to follow them with his eyes as he bakes. He takes a couple of seconds to steer his thoughts back onto the right path, “That shit is hot as hell, too.”

To his great pleasure he gets Aidan to laugh, looking right at him with a grin spreading across his face. Aidan shifts in his chair and for a second Dean’s afraid he’s going to get up and walk away, but then he presents his left hand over the table, his right hand safely tucked against his chest, “It’s great to see you again, Dean.”

It takes more willpower than he’s comfortable with to not say _‘oh god, really?’_ to that. “Me too. I mean, you, too. It’s great to see you again, too,” he responds after a beat as he shakes his hand, feeling angry at himself for not being able to handle a completely mundane situation like the fucking adult that he is. Aidan’s hand is warm and soft, and Dean would’ve really liked to hold it for a bit longer.

Luckily for him, Dean thinks, Aidan laughs and rearranges the bag of ice over his hand. It doesn’t appear to be swelling or blistering, so that’s a plus, but it’s still really pink.

Dean half-laughs and grins, “Yeah, well, I can’t help but wish the circumstances were … slightly different, though. It really wasn’t in my plans to have you scolded just so I could talk to you again.” He says and gestures towards Aidan’s hand and in a moment of not knowing what to do he searches the table for his own drink and takes a decent sip. It’s hot chocolate, very sweet; Lee’s specialty. He’s in the middle of swallowing when he realises what he just said and the hot chocolate almost spurts out of his nose, but he manages to awkwardly swallow it down without spraying Aidan’s face with it.

“Aye, I agree,” Aidan says around a laugh and removes the icepack from his hand and stares at it for a second before he lifts it up for Dean to see. “My hand looks like a fucking lobster - look at this!”

Dean doesn’t really have any good comebacks for that so he settles on trying to distract him instead, and maybe get to know the guy a bit better – that _has_ been his plan for a couple of weeks now, after all.

“Hey,” he starts, but as soon as Aidan lifts his head and looks at him all expectant and open, his brain kind of short circuits. “So how’s the baking going?” he rattles off because it’s the first thing that comes to mind and as soon as he’s uttered the words his cheeks go warm with embarrassment and he’s _this_ close to hitting himself in the head with the coffee mug.

Mentally kicking himself for being so goddamn awkward, Dean looks down at the _very nice_ Brazilian walnut table and thinks it wouldn’t be a surprise for anyone if Aidan were to suddenly leave it.

He hears Aidan chuckle, but doesn’t look at him. “Well, I’m not baking anything right now, but I’ve been testin’ out some new recipes lately.” Aidan says and there’s a smile in his voice Dean just has to see, so he looks back up and the sight of a smiling Aidan drags a laugh right out of his own mouth.

He laughs and Aidan laughs and for a moment they’ve both forgotten about the unfortunate event that got them to sit down at the same table together.

“Ahh,” Dean says, but he’s still mostly laughing so the sound he makes is something he would’ve preferred to live without. Aidan’s still grinning like an idiot across from him, all ample cheeks and stubble and dark curls. “Mind telling me what they are?” he decides to ask and hopes he hasn’t crossed some kind of invisible line.

Aidan smiles at him over the rim of his cup, “Well, if you wanna know, I could tell ya.”

Dean pauses for a second and just now sees how the colour in Aidan’s cheeks seem a bit more pink than they were before, “Of course. You’re really fucking talented, man,” he says earnestly and scoots his chair a little closer to the table. The sound it makes as it skids across the tiled floor is horrible, but Dean ignores it.

Aidan clears his throat and moves the ice-bag further up on his hand, “Thank you. Really.”

“I haven’t gotten around to try everything yet, but what I’ve tasted so far has been nothing short of awesome,” Dean tells him then, a bit too excitedly, he thinks to himself, but when he sees the blush crawling up Aidan’s neck all he can think is _fuck it._ If praising Aidan on his skills as a baker earns him that shy grin and pink cheeks, he’ll tell him this every single day.

Aidan lets out a nervous laugh and looks back at Dean. “Wait,” he suddenly says, a playful twinkle in his eyes that’s both both strangely scary and intriguing. “Are ya just complimenting me, thinking I’ll let my secret ingredients slip because-,”

“Damn it,” Dean grits out with feigned annoyance and catches himself staring when Aidan laughs; his nose scrunching up, throwing his head back and raising his shoulders almost up to his ears. Dean tells himself grown men can’t look adorable, but unfortunately, there aren’t any other words fit to describe how Aidan looks in that moment.

He takes a sip of his cocoa while it’s still hot and gives a pleased hum. “What did I do? What blew my cover?” he asks and keeps on taking small sips of the hot chocolate.

Aidan laughs again and seems to have completely forgotten the pain in his hand, “Well, yer poorly hidden over-enthusiasm for one,” he says and sits up straighter in his chair, then leans forward to rest both elbows on the table, mindful of where he keeps his injured hand.

“Hey, can’t a guy get excited over desserts?” he says and just then notices the distinct lack of dessert in front of him. He briefly wonders if he should walk over and buy something, a slice of pie or a crepe perhaps, and if it would be weird if he brought something back for Aidan, too.

His thoughts get interrupted by Aidan sending him a flat look over the table, “No guy, or lady, I’ve ever met has been this excited over my pastries, so excuse me for being a bit paranoid-,”

“Hold up, are you serious?” Dean interrupts and places his cup back on the table, leaning in over it. He catches Aidan’s eyes wandering down to his lips before quickly going back to lock his gaze with him.

“Aye,” Aidan says and clears his throat.

Dean knew it was very easy for him to mess this up and make a total asshole of himself in front of a guy he was maybe kind of starting to like, but seeing how strange and unorthodox Aidan has appeared to be already he decides to keep the conversation going even if it was going to come back and bite him in the ass.

“So,” he starts and reaches for his cup, which is starting to get a lukewarm, and grins. “Does that mean I’m your first super-fan?”

To Aidan’s credit he doesn’t even choke on his drink. Not that he was actually drinking it at the moment, but if he had it would’ve definitely ended up in the wrong pipe. He does get flustered though; a deep red blush colouring his cheeks, eyes wide like Dean had said something shocking and not-suitable-for-public-places.

It doesn’t take long for Aidan to compose himself, and when he does he tells Dean all about this new recipe him and his grandmother had come up with, and how he had planned to bring it with him in next week.

They talk a lot more after that. It seems as if some kind of barrier got broken the first time they talked, like the bubbles that had kept them in their own little worlds had finally burst. That’s how Dean feels about it anyway.

He smiles into his hot chocolate-refill, takes another bite of the blueberry pie on the plate in front of him, and continues to listen as Aidan excitedly tells him everything he wants to know.

 

 


End file.
